Realization

There is a moment maybe in all of our lives that we have a realization.  That sounds stupid...we have those all the time...but I am talking about the kind of realization that happens in the most rare of moments when things around us are going a million miles an hour and it seems that we can't make sense of it and can't slow it down and don't know where to look, what to say and what to do.  I had one the other night during my latest photo exhibit opening.  It was a surreal moment when I was looking around the room realizing that I had finally arrived in a way that I hadn't allowed myself to ever arrive before...in full bloom, full force and full love...love for what I had created, but more importantly, love for all those who have loved what I love and given me the chance to shine brighter than I ever thought I could.  This is merely the beginning but in that moment I realized that I no longer was on the freeway of confusion and frustration and angst, and I have long since left that road...i have turned my back on that road; I am walking down a very different road for the first time ever in my life.  It is a solitary road mostly...one that when I conjure it up in my mind is dirt with fields of sunflowers and intense green grass flowing and making that slightest whisper in the wind. There are birds landing and resting and flying and things are quiet except the gravel and stones under my feet as I walk in the very middle of the road at a slower pace than ever before so I am able to practice the moment of breathing in the smells and sights.  I don't usually look back on this road as I can't see the end of it and it curves and meanders and goes up and down, but if I were to get out in front and turn around to watch myself walking down this road I would see behind me a never-ending mountain range with forests, and snow and storms and the sun would be shining...the realization that I have finally had is that all those years of walking through the scary places and the mountains, and the forests have prepared me to walk into the blazing light of the dusty road we all call home and that road is beautiful and rich and wide and full of love.